Seth Peterson walks into the Carlton Cinema a fashionable twenty minutes late. Unlike his co-star Chad Donella, I recognize Peterson instantly. Handsome, articulate, and unassuming, the former Providence star is in town with his wife and daughter to promote his new movie Hate Crime. When I ask him if fans of his former TV show may be a little shocked by this current role as a gay tax accountant, he gives me a sympathetic look and tells me, “I’m just a working actor. I’m not famous enough that anybody’s going to care, I choose projects based on how I respond to the material.”
Peterson, who assumes the role of Robbie Levinson, says he enjoyed playing “someone outside the norm of who I usually play. In order for me to make process as interesting as possible I wanted to make the character a real tight-ass, like a real stiff kind of guy, not a lot of animation, someone who hides the way he feels from those around him except for the people he’s closest to. I thought it would make the character’s transformation much more believable when he gets to the end of his rope.”
While Peterson has never known anyone who has been the victim of a hate crime he tells me, “I grew up in Los Angeles in a predominantly Hispanic neighbourhood, and I used to get picked on all the time being the only white kid, that’s probably the closest I’ve come to being discriminated against. But I’ve seen violence, I’ve seen a lot of violence, you know I used to hang out with some pretty crazy cats when I was growing up and I’ve always been ‘allergic’ [to violence]. I get a physical reaction, a sick feeling in my stomach when people get violent against each other, so this is where the film hits close to home for me … I cannot stand injustice. It's one of those universal things that make people crazy and I have no tolerance for injustice against anybody, it doesn’t make sense to me.”
Peterson is also quick to deflect criticisms of his character before I can bring them into the discussion, he leans forward in his chair and explains, “I love that this character takes a stand, I’m not saying I would take that stand, to meet the same end of this character, but usually we like to think that if we have a problem with people we will be there to help and if we aren’t - then who knows what happens?”
When asked about the buzz surrounding the film Peterson is more philosophical, perhaps even a little frustrated at what he senses are distracting issues, “This film has received both [positive and negative] kinds of attention, you know? I appreciate all of it to be honest. If you hate if great, if it made you angry I’m happy. If it made you think and talk then it did its job. Just to get this movie out there and get people talking is what this movie was about for me.”
You can sense Seth Peterson, a dedicated stage actor, is eager to get to work on his next project. He tells me he is about to star in The Mad Woman of Chailot back in Los Angeles. When I ask him about his dream role he says, “I played it, years ago I played Billy Bibit in stage production of One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. I love to play people who are deeply wounded, mentally or physically, and he had so many issues, I loved that part.”
Francois Dupraz
